Product Description

When Alice, shy, dumpy, bored and unhappy with herself, wanders the City of London during her lunch hour, she stumbles without warning into a situation which will revolutionise her life. Brought up by a strict maiden aunt devoted to rationalism, Alice hardly foresees that she'll be drawn into the mysterious, seemingly irrational world of a healing centre based at a church, where chaos and moral breakdown is an ever-present threat to the off-beat but very human inhabitants who struggle to help others survive the maelstrom of modern life. There's Lewis, the irascible traditionalist, a priest of the old school who has problems dealing with women, homosexuals and the liberal spirit of the age; Rosalind, who appears so glamorous and successful but is in truth unhappy and unfulfilled; Francie, a woman who may or may not be deluded but who burns above all to be loved; Stacy, the naive young trainee searching for the right direction as he becomes increasingly lost; and finally Nicholas, the one-time shady wonder-worker now determined to stay honest - even as he finds himself drawn towards danger, damage and demoralisation.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #218859 in Books
• Published on: 2004-01-15
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 624 pages

Review
'She is a deft storyteller, and her writing has depth, grace and pace' SUNDAY TIMES 'Truly unputdownable' THE TIMES 'Susan Howatch may well become the Anthony Trollope of the 20th century' Andrew Greeley, INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY 'Magnificent modern saga' COUNTRY LIVING 'Howatch presents a perfectly balanced and, in places savagely damning, portrait of our times' TATLER

About the Author
Born in 1940 Susan graduated in law then emigrated to America where she married, had a daughter & began her career as a writer. She returned to England after 4 years in Ireland living first in Salisbury - inspiration for the very successful Starbridge sequence & now lives in London.

Customer Reviews

Beware - you may already have this book!!
I am a huge fan of this author and the Starbridge/St Benet's novels and so you can imagine my disappointment this morning when I received The Wonder Worker, which is a repackaging of 'A Question of Integrity'.

Not even the author's note that this was her original choice for the title of the novel can ease my feeling of being ripped off. Rarely do I buy two copies of one novel by choice!!

This is A Question of Integrity
Hmm... I was getting quite excited about another book related to the Starbridge characters - especially Nicholas Darrow, but received the book today to discover that it is A Question of Integrity, rebadged under a different name. It's still a great book, the characters are explored in depth and you really feel that you know them and care about what happens to them.

Another compelling story of spitiual struggle and intrigue
The Wonder Worker, by Susan Howatch, is another in her series about spiritual struggles within the Anglican clergy. It is not technically a "Starbridge" novel, because it takes place in London, but it does include many of the same group of characters, with a few additions. Nicholas Darrow, a psychic priest, faces a moral dilemma involving pride and the misuse of his gifts. Caught up in his healing ministry, he flounders, blunders, then regains his spiritual equilibrium with the help of an irascible colleague and a formidable Roman Catholic nun. The plot is similar, in respect to the spiritual path of the protagonist, to the others in the Starbridge series. The reader need not have read the others in the Starbridge series to enjoy the latest work. However, readers will want to explore the previous Starbridge novels after reading The Wonder Worker. Spiced with intrigue and a particularly nasty bout with demons, the novel entertains and engages as it leads to the surprising denouement.